How the Aqeedah Must be Established

Islam was revealed to be a mercy to all of mankind, and its message was indeed addressed to all of
mankind, Muslim and non-muslim. Consequently when we discuss the establishment of the Islamic
aqeedah it has to be done in light of this fact.

Using an ayah of the Quran may work on a Muslim but has no authority with the non-Muslim. Before
addressing this topic the definitionof the word aqeedah needs to be stated

Aqueeda- What the heart is knotted on or tied to, after the mind has become convinced. This aqeedah
has
to be decisive and based on evidences,

Also the menaing of iman is a decisive beliefreached through evidences

From the first two definitions it becomes clear that the mind is an important feature at arriving at the
aqeedah. As a matter offact it is the only way sanctioned by Islam towards reaching or arriving at the
aqeedah. Before discussing this fhrther let us look at ways in which people in general arrive at belief or
aqeedah. ‘.—~.

Imitation

Imitation in belief is a common practise among people. Usually children assume the beliefof their
parents
without any questioning of the beliefby itself. This is an invalid method since the belief is taken
regardless
of its correctness.

So, we find many people worshipping cows, rocks or men only because their parents did so!

Emotion

Arriving at belief through the emotions alone is invalid. As a matter of factmankind started started
worshipping idols because they were led by their emotions. The emotions at all times should be led by
their mind and chaos results if emotions are left unchecked,.

Reaction

Reactionary belief is also invalid. We find for example some African Americams adopting either
egyptology, ancestor worship as a reaction to the “white man’, enslavement, rejecting christianity, which
is portrayed as a religion where the saviour has a blonde hair and blue eyes.

So when they carry belief, they went far, saying that God is black, white man is devil which is
completely
absurd!

Consequently, the correct way to arrive at belief is through the mind and emotions(fitrah).The quran
addressed this in many ayah. For example...

“And of his signs is the creation of the heavens and the earth and the difference of your languages and
colours. Lo! Herein indeed are signs for men of knowledge.” ~3U:22]

“Will they not regard the camels, how they are created! And the heavens, how they are raised! And the
hills, how they are set up! And the earth how it is spread.! [88:17-20]

We can quote many ayah which call mankind to think, consider arid contemplate and ponder over
creation in order to arrive at proper belief. After the mind is convinced to the point where there remains
no doubt which is in compliance with fitrah(emotions), the heart automatically knots and clings to this
decisive unshakable belief or aqeedah.

When we say that the mind is the tool used to arrive at belief, we do not mean that the process one uses
has to be as rigorous as a scientist, analysing the makeup of the atom or the cell, to arrive at the
aqeedah.
Rather, we mean that from simlple exercises in rational thinking, one can undoubtedly reach this
conclusion. Let us look at some occurrences in history where this was applied.

Prophet Ibrahim had a debate with a ruler regarding the creator ofthe heavens and the earth.
Jbrahim(as)
said that his Lord gave life and caused death. The ruler in response told his ministers to bring to men in
fromt of him. He gave an order to kill one and allowed the other to live, and then declared, ‘I also give
life and cause death.’ Our father Ibrahim then addressed him with the following challenge, ‘My Lord
causes the sun to rise from the East. Can you make it rise from the West?.’ The ruler was ofcourse left
speechless and embarrassed.(This was mentioned in al-Baqarah:259)

Umar bin Al-Khattab, the second Kalifah of Islam(ra), was seen crying and the laughing. He was asked
why did he do so, to which he replied, ‘We used to make our gods out of dates, and when we became
hungry we used to eat them, that is why I am laughing.’

Abu Haneefah, a foremost scholar in the history of Islam, had a debate with an athiest regarding the
Creator. On the day ofthe debate Abu Haneefah sent his students to the place of the debate to wait with
the athiest for his arrrival. Abu Haneefah arrived purposefully late and was asked by the no irate atheist
as
to his tardiness. Abu Haneefah told him, that on his way to the debate, he reached a river, and there
were
no boats no people present. He waited for while only to see a tree fall and immediately carve itself into
a
boat. The boat then came to the river bank and summoned him to get in. He did so and the boat took
him
to the other side of the river.

The extremely irritated athiest replied that this was absolutely unbelievable. Abu Haneefah then retorted
that if this was unbelievable, how then can one say that the sun, moon and the universe was created in
the same fashion. The debate was over.

Consequently, the tool used to reach beliefor the aqeedah must be the mind and the evidences used to
ascertain this beliefmust be decisive. This method is called the rational method. This is the only method
that should be used to arrive at belief

Rational Method

Some people believe that the rational method id very rigid and philisophic, and other believe it to be
blasphemy to even suggest using this method to arrive at belief As we mentioned before, the Quran
pushes us to ponder upon the earth, camel, sea, stars, the development of the foetus in the womb and
many other situations to reach a certain conclusion.

When we study the rain for example we fmd that the rain follows a definite rule or law, that can be
called
evaporation or condenstation. This is a well mechanised process, where every step is systematic and
cannot be changed. When the rain exists as a liquid (water), its chemical makeup is H20 or two atoms
of
hydrogen and one atom of oxygen. During the evaporation process where the form ofthe rain water
changes to a vapor or gas, its chemical makeup remains the same. Oxygen and hydrogen exists
abundandtly in the atmosphere, but this does not affect the evaporisation process at all.

There are some scientists who claim that things in the universe happen randomly and haphazardly,
without any system. If this were so, then there would be at least one or more times when one of these
 hydrogen or oxygen atoms would collide with the vapor form of water to change or alter the
evaporation
process. As far as we know the evaporation and condensation process occurs over and over again,
according to the same process, without interference. It is rather irrational to call such a process a
random
haphazard process. That is because it is well known that any two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom,
does not make water. There has to be a specific system or process that causes these elements to combine
to make water. We inevitably have to deduce that this and many other processes and systems present in
the universe are all being controlled by a power and forve with the ability and might to run and control
them all at once.

When we look at the human being, we find that the human being sleeps and dies, but these universal
systems run perpetually, so it cannot be said that a human is in control ofthe systems ofthe universe.
Nor can it be said of an anima, albeit, it cannot be said of anything within the universe. We then reach
the
conclusion that this force or power or might that runs the universe in this systematic way is the Lord,
Master, Creator, Originator, Organiser of the univers, Allah the Glorified, the Exalted.

Wejust employed the rational method to reach this Ultimate Conclusion. We applied our senses to a
subject matter(rain), transferred it to the brain, and then linked this subject matter to previous
information
that we had about rain(evaporation, condensation chemical makeups etc..) and fmally connected this
information to other related information(systems could not be created or contorlled by anything within
creation), to reach our Ultimate Conclusion. (Allah alone controls the universe.) So we see that this is
not
a philosophical process since philosophy incorporates hypothetical guesses illusionary thinking and
logic.
Yes logic! Logic is an invalid way of thinking vis a vis, reaching the Ultimate Conclusion.

Logic

What is meant by logic here is the acient Greek way of thinking which influenced many Muslims such
as
the ‘Mu’atiazilah’. It is an invalid type of thinking regarding the Ultimate Conclusion because it usually
results in deceiving or misleading and contradicting conclusions, The process of logic is to state an
introductory premise, then to build steps or points towards reaching a conclusion. The danger in this
type
ofthinking is that if the premise is incorrect or if any ofthe intermediate steps are incorrect, the
conclusion may be correct, and there are times when the premise or step is correct and the result is
• incorrect. Hence, the conclusion may be deceiving or misleading. An example of logical process is to
say,
a blackboard is made ofwood, wood buns, therefore all blackboards bum. Also, logic is controlled by
formulas and techniques and does not care about the information, as long as the techniques and
sequences, regardless of whether or not the information is correct. However, we can see instances where
logic can lead to contradictory results. Consider the following examples:

So we find that using logic can lead to two contradictory results. Regarding the Ultimate Conclusion,
the
Christians for example, used logic to arrive at a very erroneous and dangerous conclusion. They
claimed
that God’s image is that of a man. Then after a while they commissioned an artist to paint the likeness of
God and His representation was that of a blond haired, blue eyed white man. (We seek refuge in Allah
from ever making this type of error.)

Another feature of logic, is that there are no limits t the types of conclusions that can be reached with
logic. As the previous examples have shown, those who use logic have anthropormorphized
(represented
in human characteristics) Allah. Even the Muslims who have employed logic have fallen pray to this
error.
 We fmd that even to this day, some Muslims debating on the form or shape, texture or quality of Allah’s
“hands”, “face”, “sitting”, “ascending” etc... These Muslims do not recognise that thinking about such
concepts depends upon the ability to sense the topic. Since we can only sense what is within the limits
of
the universe, and since Allah has told us that He has only given us a small amount of information, then
the human mind is limited to the amount and degree of things that it can think about.

This does not mean that since Allah is outside of this universe, then we cannot think about Allah. As we
have shown before, we are able to arrive at the Ultimate Conclusion based on the effects of the aspect
of
Allah as the Creator, the Organiser, the Originator and the Controller of the Universe. We do no initiate
a
discussion about the essence of the Creator. Any discussion about the essence of the Creator, is an
exercise in futility.

Consequently only the rational method can lead to the Ultimate Conclusion, in a way that leaves one
with
decisive certaintyand that is in accordance with man’s nature. And consequently filling the heart with
tranquility.